Connecticut Supreme Court Rules Candidates Who Receive Public Funding Cannot be Restricted from Criticizing Candidates in Races Other than Their Own

Posted on by May 20, 2024

On May 20, the Connecticut Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion in Moakley v State Elections Enforcement Commission. Connecticut has public funding for candidates for state office. The issue was whether the state could insist that public financed candidates refrain from using any public funding to criticize a candidate running in a race other than their own race. The state had fined several Republican state legislators for receiving public funding and then criticizing the Democratic nominee for Governor, who was running for re-election the same year.

The lower court had upheld fines levied against the Republican legislative candidates, but the lower court is now reversed.

Comments

Connecticut Supreme Court Rules Candidates Who Receive Public Funding Cannot be Restricted from Criticizing Candidates in Races Other than Their Own — 8 Comments

  1. NOOO PUBLIC FUNDING OF ANY CANDIDATES —

    TAXPAYER CASH FOR CANDIDATE ENEMIES OF THE TAXPAYERS

  5. From the Connecticut Constitution:

    Sec. 4. Every citizen may freely speak, write and publish his sentiments on all
    subjects, being responsible for the abuse of that liberty.

    Sec. 5. No law shall ever be passed to curtail or restrain the liberty of speech or of
    the press.

    i.e. the government can never be the one to make someone “responsible for the abuse” of speech. The CT Supreme Court put two and two together.

  6. Good, now remove the restriction on criticizing candidates in ones own race, and abolish all public funding for candidates.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.